It signals that the web advertising giant is more than happy to hoover up personal data from anyone willing to hand over their home address, age, their motor's registration number, and other sensitive information.

Google spent £37.7m on BeatThatQuote in March 2011 to beef up the Chocolate Factory's credit card and insurance-related offerings in the UK. Car insurance packages are now listed alongside price comparisons for bank accounts and cards in Google's search engine.

Google has attempted to ward off privacy concerns about its price comparison offerings by opting users out of receiving marketing material from companies by default. That said, as with other such sites, anyone wanting to bag cheaper deals from third-party partners must hand over their telephone number first.

BeatThatQuote's one-time managing director John Paleomylites, who owned 90 per cent of the online property at the time of Google's takeover, is now the Chocolate Factory's price comparison product boss.

He told Which? magazine: "We want to help consumers find the best car insurance in the fastest and most honest way possible while completely respecting their privacy." ®